Stories like this fascinate me, not so much because of the policies being discussed, but because of the political minutia that has to be taken into consideration any time an elected official makes an announcement.
In this case, as pointed out by Governing.com's blog, The 13th Floor:
...Washington, D.C.'s Adrian Fenty has joined the ranks of the rail-riding pols -- well, temporarily:
The mayor's advisers were stumped. No one could agree on the savviest way to handle the sensitive political situation.
How would Mayor Adrian M. Fenty travel 2.1 miles from the John A. Wilson Building to Cardozo High School on Clifton Street NW for a news conference in which he was to tell residents to protect the environment and leave their cars behind?Showing up in his usual gas-guzzling, government-issued Lincoln Navigator seemed politically incorrect. The Metro was an option, but Fenty was running late and would have to walk several blocks. Someone offered a vehicle from the city's fleet of hybrids, but the mayor ruled that out. He countered by offering to hop on the expensive Cannondale bicycle he uses for triathlons, but then aides reminded him that he might become sweaty in his navy business suit.
So he walked up 14th Street NW and took the No. 52 bus north.
This happens so often. An elected official wants to make a statement about gas prices so he or she arrives at the press conference in a hybrid car only to be excoriated by labor unions who complain about the foreign car. A mayor encourages everyone to ride public transportation but then travels everywhere in a veritable motorcade of large, tinted-window, SUVs. The media has a field day with the contradiction and gives very little coverage to the substance of what was said.
I don't have much of a point other than to say that it will be interesting to watch the next mayor, who so far has avoided these lapses of common sense, to see if he can keep it up.